


A Nameday Scandal

by Egleriel



Series: Nameday Gifts [3]
Category: A Song of Ice and Fire - George R. R. Martin, Game of Thrones (TV)
Genre: F/M, jon pov
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-22
Updated: 2018-01-22
Packaged: 2019-03-07 22:35:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,114
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13444833
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Egleriel/pseuds/Egleriel
Summary: Jon and Dany's bring in new rules of engagement for the great houses, and Sansa couldn't be happier about it.





	A Nameday Scandal

**Author's Note:**

  * For [AdultOrphan](https://archiveofourown.org/users/AdultOrphan/gifts).



> _Prompt: They tell Jon, Bran and Arya they wish to marry. Bran knows the future and what must happen with Sansan. Does Arya add to her funny little list?_
> 
> Switching it up a little because in this AU, Bran never came south and Rickon isn't dead.

On Arya’s six-and-tenth nameday, and in the moon that followed, Jon Snow learned a great deal about the women who populated his life.

For starters, Arya herself. She had always been the dearest to him of all his Stark kin. He had arranged for a very special gift to be made in recognition of the day she came of age: a replica of Needle sized up to suit a young lady’s hand. Jon racked his brain trying to think of a good name for it, but in the end decided to let Arya decide – as she did the last time. As she did in all things, in truth.

When no answer came, Jon pushed in to her tower room and found it empty. The bed was unmade, and a lit candle drew his eye to the table. Jon was surprised to see a note addressed to him.

 

Dany turned white with fury and accused Jon of playing her for a fool. For the first time since the end of the war, Jon was reminded of the queen’s fragility when events transpired beyond her control. There was nothing to say when a mood like this took her, and Jon was relieved when Dany asked him for privacy while she spoke to Samwell.

 

Sansa was less surprised than Jon would have expected. He steeled himself for Lady Stark to faint away at the scandal of it all, but she barely reacted at all. She paused in her sewing and smiled pleasantly up at him.

“For a girl who hates songs, she certainly has an instinct for romance,” Sansa mused.

“Is it romantic for a girl of six-and-ten to run off with some lordling she barely knows?”

“Arya knows Gendry Baratheon very well,” said Sansa, returning placidly to her handkerchief. “I think they were sweethearts of a sort before she went to Braavos. Much more romantic than a match made by contract – or even how your parents came together.”

She had him there. Sansa sent her hulking great bruiser of a shield to fetch her maid to the library, so Jon and the Hound descended the serpentine steps together. There was a smirk on the big man’s face that irritated Jon to no end.

“Is something funny, Clegane?” Jon demanded.

The Hound startled. “Not funny, your grace,” he said gruffly. The courtesy left his mouth awkwardly, with a little too much emphasis. “I’m fond of the little wolf… pup. I hope it makes her happy. If it pleases your majesties.”

Jon stopped and frowned at the man. “I hope so, too,” he said at last.

The mood mellowed a little when they fell back into step.

“I was thinking about the plans kings make,” said the Hound. “Robert loved the notion of marrying his son to Ned Stark’s daughter. It looks like he got his wish, in the end. The boy – Robert’s son – he’s no Joffrey. That’s all I’m saying.”

I’ll have to hope you’re right, Jon thought.

* * *

 

Two historians arrived from the Citadel before the fortnight was through, bearing lineages of all the great houses going right back to the Andal invasion. Scrolls littered the private solar where the family was wont to gather, all with heirs marked to the fortieth in line. Sansa was telling Dany all of the connexions of some Vale house when Jon finally lost patience.

“Daenerys, what is this all about?”

“Is there something wrong with trying to understand the realm I rule?”

“Don’t insult my intelligence. What are you doing?”

“Forgive my husband, Lady Sansa,” said Daenerys icily. “He does not appear to appreciate the situation.”

She dropped three scrolls on the main table with aplomb. As they struck, they unravelled to reveal ornate sigils inked in full colour. Even in private, Jon’s queen couldn’t resist a little drama.

“Let’s look, shall we?” said the Queen archly, a perfect silver eyebrow stretched high. “Arya Stark just married the Lord of Storm’s End. That is to say, this Arya Stark.”

She jabbed at the scroll topped with the Stark direwolf. Beneath her slender finger was Arya’s name and the number 3 in purple ink.

“Of course, I might be mistaken. Mayhaps the Lord of Storm’s End wed this Arya Stark. Or this one.”

The dragon queen tapped Arya’s name on the Tully scroll, where it was marked with a 4, and again on the Arryn scroll – though her place in the line of succession there was far less significant.

Daenerys walked around the table and took Jon’s hands, looking worried.

She’s so young, Jon reminded himself. She’s seen as many names as Sansa, yet I can’t imagine her as the carefree young girl Sansa once was.

“The great houses can’t keep intermarrying,” Dany sighed. “Imagine Arya’s son, with her will and the Usurper’s look. Lord of Storm’s End is one thing, but a couple of fruitless marriages or a spring sickness and that boy will rule from the Dornish Marches to the Wall. His lands will cut my kingdom in two.”

She was right, of course. It was a threat he hadn’t even considered. Rickon’s regency would be long; much could happen in that time. Who was to say that Sansa’s next marriage would be any more successful than her last? No wonder Dany had agreed so readily to an annulment between Tyrion and Sansa. It was one of her few requests when she first met the High Septon. Jon had assumed Tyrion had asked for his freedom.

“What do you propose we do?” asked Jon quietly.

“I don’t wish to make an enemy of Gendry Baratheon, and still less of Arya Stark,” said Dany, her eyes filling with the gentleness that Jon loved most in her. “We will need to issue a decree. The Great Houses will need the crown’s permission if they wish to broker marriages with each other.”

He nodded. Jon looked past Dany to the scrolls again.

“If they can’t marry each other, they’ll marry their bannermen. We’re sowing the seeds for the next century of power struggles: how long before every house has a claimant for the lord’s seat?”

Dany frowned. “They already do. In the world we’re building, loyalty is not bought with marriage contracts. It comes from just rule.”

“They could marry each other’s bannermen for a generation,” Jon said slowly.

“That could work. It will need a great deal of thought before we make our move.”

Jon smiled and glanced at his sister. “What do you think, Sansa? I could ask Sam to introduce you to his brother Dickon. He might be more to your taste than Willas Tyrell anyway.”

Sansa laughed and brushed it off, as she did with every offer to dine with eligible men, and true to form Sansa immediately made her excuses and left. As she went, Jon couldn’t help noticing how radiantly her face had lit up.

So like her lady mother, but kinder. And the more beautiful for it.

Before the moon’s turn, Sansa and her retinue had taken ship for White Harbour. “Come north soon, cousin,” said Sansa on the dock, always proper and correct – yet her embrace was as warm as a sister. “When I next see you at Winterfell, we’ll talk about my marriage.”

Sansa spared a curtsey for Queen Daenerys, allowed Rickon to hug Jon one last time, and then went below deck.

* * *

 

That visit took place only a few moons later. Jon found the Lady Regent of the North in the Winterfell godswood, dappled in glorious sunlight beneath the summer sky. Sansa sat near the weirwood with her back to him, her deep auburn hair and white gown a perfect match for the heart tree.

Nearby, Rickon and his wild wolf tumbled in the grass, and Jon felt the absence of the lost Starks more keenly than he had since the war. Arya was missing too, of course; Daenerys hinted darkly how she thought Arya might be with child. Pregnancy was always a touchy subject with Dany, but Jon could appreciate her reasons.

Shaggydog was the first to notice his approach. Rickon squealed and ran to Jon, throwing his arms around the king’s waist. Sansa rose gracefully and received him with every courtesy.

Then she stunned him by launching straight into the topic of her nuptials.

“As you know,” Sansa said matter-of-factly, “I am a woman grown and flowered. Ordinarily, it would be for the head of my house to arrange my marriage, and the head of my house is Rickon, Lord Stark.”

On cue, Shaggydog started rolling around in the long grass and Rickon followed suit, a skinny finger up his nose.

“As Lord Rickon is in his minority, the job falls to his regent. Which is me.”

Jon frowned. “Sansa, are you wearing a wedding gown?”

Sansa blushed prettily and looked at the ground. She ignored the question. “Even under the new rules, I don’t need the permission of my king to make a match. But you are my family,” she said firmly, “and I would have your blessing.”

“Sansa,” he insisted. “Why are you wearing a wedding gown?”

“Because if we do have your blessing, then I would not wait an hour longer.”

Sansa wandered closer to the heart tree and took the arm of her huge, maimed guard. Jon would have taken it all for a monstrous jape if not for the look the two exchanged.

Jon’s mouth went dry. He could not begin to imagine what Sansa saw in Sandor Clegane; all he could think of was how profoundly his silly sister had changed. There had been a time when Sansa only cared for a pretty face; the Hound’s mangled cheek and permanent scowl could not have been further from her golden prince of old.

Except the scowl was gone now, Jon realised.

The Hound placed his hand over Sansa’s with a delicacy Jon would never have suspected in the man. Looking down at her, the rage had drained from his face entirely, and Jon glimpsed the man that Sansa presumably cared for. He also noticed a stained cloak of white wool draped over the big man’s arm.

Shaggy chose that moment to pour himself around the couple’s feet like an overgrown housepet, then remembered what he was and leapt to his feet, growling furiously at a raven that had landed in the branches above. The raven fluttered off, quorking, “Pups! Pups!”

Although he’d been looking for just a moment, Jon’s mind flashed with images of the two of them together. He saw the Hound kill for Sansa and their gentleness together. He saw a family dinner, with brawny dark-haired sons cutting meat for their sisters, who reminded Jon of Arya and Sansa both: slender and pretty, but fierce. All of them older, watching a son at tourney. It might not have been a queendom, but by the old gods and the new, she looked happy in his odd daydream.

“If your heirs rule Winterfell, they do so as Starks,” he said firmly.

Sansa ran to embrace him while Clegane advanced to shake his hand. Jon could feel the man trembling.

 

With the briefest glance at the heart tree, Sansa took Sandor’s hands. “Who claims this woman?” she asked quietly, her voice as soft as the sound of falling snow.

“I, Sandor of house Clegane, claim her. Who takes this man?”

“I take this man,” said Sansa.

The Hound opened the clasp on Sansa’s gossamer-thin cloak and let it pool around her feet. It was made of some sheer grey fabric that Jon had not even noticed from afar, and it made the pair look like they stood in water. The Hound shook out the filthy white cloak and fastened it as Sansa’s bride cloak. Jon frowned, but saved his questions for later.

When the two had exchanged a kiss, the Hound blinked as though he’d just woken up. “Is that it?” he asked.

A tear spilled from Sansa’s eye as she nodded. “We’re wed.”

Jon cleared his throat. “Welcome to the family, Sandor,” he said as normally as he could manage. “You’ll find that the Starks are dog people.”

* * *

 

“Mutt,” said Arya by way of greeting.

“Bitch,” replied Sandor calmly, then he chuckled. “You look like you’ll be having your litter soon enough.”

Arya narrowed her eyes, getting back to the point. There was one reason she had waddled out to receive her sister and goodbrother, and one reason only.

“Hurt her, and you’re going back on the list.”

Sandor gazed wistfully towards the stables, where his beautiful wife was dismounting. It was clear that the scale of Storm’s End overawed her somewhat.

“If I ever end up hurting her, I might save you the trouble.”

 


End file.
